


a shining star

by TheLegendOfEm



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: First Meeting, LeoNiles Week 2018, M/M, Rated T for Niles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-23
Updated: 2018-08-23
Packaged: 2019-07-01 15:42:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15777084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLegendOfEm/pseuds/TheLegendOfEm
Summary: Niles remembers his first meeting with Leo like it was yesterday.Written for LeoNiles Week 2018, day one prompt: Meetings





	a shining star

**Author's Note:**

> Please go check out @leonilesweek on tumblr!!

Leo was, and had always been, a shining star to Niles. He was white-hot, both with light and with fire, he was more intense than anyone Niles had ever met. In short, he was intoxicating. He’d been hypnotic from the very day they met. 

Niles remembered it well, every detail. Whenever sleep eluded him, he would think of Leo, think of the day they’d first met, and the searing memory of it would wipe anything else from his head. 

He’d been seventeen, skinny as a rake, dressed in rags and filthy bandages. His ‘friends’ had left him to die; a scapegoat for their ill-fated plan to rob Castle Krakenburg of its riches. There had been a stab wound in his leg, and castle guards chasing him down every corridor. 

Still, he’d not given up hope of escape. Not until something sharp wrapped around his ankle, and all of a sudden he was sprawled ungracefully over the floor. Niles remembered hitting his head on the cold stone, which was probably why the next few seconds appeared to him as they did. 

He recalled looking up, and seeing a figure dressed in white, surrounded by an eerie purple glow. His first and only thought had been of angels, somehow. The sharp things had surrounded him, bonding his arms to his sides, and Niles had realised that they were vines, vines covered in vicious thorns that had dug deep into his arms and chest. He still had the scars; sometimes he would run his fingers over them and let the faint pain bring him back to his memories. 

Then his vision had un-blurred, and he had faced the reality of his situation. A teenage boy in a nightgown, radiating magical energy from an old, purple tome. Bound up and hurting all over, all Niles had done was grin. 

Leo hadn’t liked that; he’d clenched his fists, and the vines had tightened enough to make Niles groan with pain. But oh, pain like that was just delicious. Every time he watched Leo murder an enemy with those vines, Niles couldn’t help but think back to his own experience with them and shiver. 

“Who are you?” Leo’s voice was still somewhat high-pitched back then, but he had nevertheless managed to sound more powerful and more terrifying than anyone Niles had ever heard before. Angels had still been on his mind, delirious with pain and exhaustion and hunger as he was; Leo seemed like an angel of death, here to drag him to hell like he deserved. 

“Absolutely no one,” he’d replied, voice rough with pain. Leo had narrowed his eyes, and tightened the vines just a little bit more. “...My name is Niles,” he had admitted. 

“And my name is Prince Leo. I’ve heard you are an invader to this castle, so do you have any last words before I end your miserable little life?” Leo was so good at dirty talk, Niles had said teasingly several years later. Joking aside, though, those words had pierced him right to the core. He was going to die at the hands of this angel of a prince, and he’d never wanted anything more. 

“Make it as slow as you’d like, my prince,” he’d said, and closed his eye to wait for the pain to overtake him. He’d waited, and waited, but nothing came. Twenty seconds later, he’d opened his eye again to find Leo giving him a curious look. “What?”

“I don’t think I want you dead after all, Niles.” Leo had stepped closer to him, and crouched down, and one pale hand still hot from magic had lifted Niles’ chin a little to face him. In all his life, Niles had never been met with such a searching gaze. It felt like Leo was burning into his soul, sweeping aside years of defences with a single look. 

That was the last thing Niles remembered of their first meeting. His vision had gone white after that, and he’d awoken in a soft bed with food and water next to him and clothes folded on a chair nearby. It was unreal to him, and yet somehow, the look Leo had given him had made him feel as though nothing was impossible. He had an angel on his side, a bright star who had somehow seen something of worth in him. From their very first meeting, Leo had broken him down, changed him, and there hadn’t been a day since then that Niles hadn’t been grateful for it.


End file.
